(Indefinite hiatus) Arthur Wright has always liked to think in the box until a 4-dimensional being takes him away from his home into the world of four dimensions where his universe's existence is a matter of animal conservation.
Arthur gasped for air. He was standing in the middle of a field of grass or whatever this four-dimensional equivalent of grass was called. The tops of the plant fluttered in and out of space with a 4d wind that Arthur was apparently immune to from his 4d side except for a strange tingling. In the corner of his eye, Arthur saw Carlos who had a gauntlet of his own.
"Hey." Arthur ran to Carlos. "We're in the same place."
"I guess we're being paired," Carlos said, "Or they're putting us with who we got picked up with."
"Maybe they got people from other countries speaking different languages." Arthur suggested. "In order to get diverse samples. You got a weird talking to as well, right?"
"Yeah," said Carlos, "They said we should look for some sort of mineral. I can't remember the name. It was really weird."
"The creature told me that it was deadly. What could he mean by that?" Arthur said.
"I don't know." Carlos answered, "But before we figure that out, we need to find some food and shelter. Maybe we could find some nuts or berries."
"What's poisonous here?" Arthur asked, "And how are we supposed to digest something 4d. Would it have a foreign chemical structure or be infinitely heavier than us."
"Well." Carlos said, "The ambassador wouldn't leave us here if we couldn't survive and we haven't been crushed by the air above us yet."
Arthur didn't think Carlos sounded too sure of himself and decided not to argue, figuring it best to find something that looked edible. It would be better to commit suicide and die a few days earlier by poison than to die from thirst and hunger.
"Let's stick together. How about that way." said Carlos pointing toward a river.
"No, I'd rather go that way." said Arthur pointing up toward a top of a hill.
"Good idea." said Carlos, "We could get a layout of the land."
Arthur didn't actually think of that and just wanted to defy Carlos. But away they went up the hill. They climbed over falling trees and witnessed many strange trunks that disappeared in the air and branches that were supported from nowhere. They would slip on more steep parts of the hill and rocks would tumble down and disappear.
"I always hated steep slopes like this." said Carlos, "You could never tell exactly what way is down. You can't decide whether to crawl and climb the hill like a ladder or to walk up the slope like steps."
"What is down?" Arthur asked, "It's just going toward gravity. It changes depending on where you are. I remember thinking as a child that Australia must be upside down and the people must walk on bridges between their hanging buildings. And also that people on the equator lived in cliff houses. But down is always changing with the arc of the earth as you travel. I've heard that a couple bridges were so large that the curvature of the earth was taken into account in their construction but I don't know if that's true or just a factoid to sound cool. Not only that, there's also differences in mass of the earth due to the continents and mountains. Maybe this hill is pulling on us enough to change our gravity toward it slightly."
"Well it's not pulling on us enough relative to this planet to make this a smooth incline, so excuse me if I'm not grateful." Carlos whined.
On the way up the slope, the boys grabbed a few berries off of bushes on the cliff. When they made it to the top, they were disappointed by the trees being in the way of their view in some parts.
"We haven't used our gauntlets, have we." Carlos said.
"I've been scared to touch the buttons and dials." Arthur answered. "What if something bad happens?"
"Then we'll do it together." Carlos said.
They grabbed each other's gauntlets with their free hands. They felt a flow of energy between them.
"Which should we change first?" Carlos asked.
"How about this green switch?" Arthur answered.
Carlos and Arthur both pushed their green switches together and the gauntlets recognized that they wished to travel together and kept them in sync. Carlos and Arthur felt the ground beneath them fall like a stretched trampoline and they fell into each other in confusion. They both gasped in shock.
"The hill shrunk!" cried Arthur.
But it was over. They moved just a tiny bit before they let go of the switch and the spring-loaded switches went back into their places.
"No." Carlos responded, "We slid down another slope of the hill. You think we should try another."
"No more switches." Arthur said, "I don't want to stand on jelly again."
"We'll try a dial this time." Carlos said, "I have to know if my theory is right."
"Okay," said Arthur.
They got back into place, sitting on the ground this time as if they were about to meditate. They moved each other's yellow dials 90 degrees clockwise. This time the earth bent beneath them until they saw that they were no longer on the top of the hill but on a slope up an even bigger hill than the one they were on before.
"I knew it!" said Carlos, "That's the slope we slid down!"
Gauntlet controls:
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